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Message: <blockquote data-quote="el-remmen" data-source="post: 1372105" data-attributes="member: 11">Session #52 (part ii)The place was damp and dark.  Torrents of water fell hither and thither, in great cascades through openings made my slabs of stone leaning on each other, and dripping endlessly through cracks, making all the stone surfaces slick and shiny in the few place the muted light of moon made its way through cloud, mist and stone.  And the sound seemed to echoes from all corners, making Ratchis unable to even hear his own breathing, though the misting of it in the cold dampness reminded him that he still did draw breath.The broken stones that had long ago erupted from the earth, made a huge chamber not thirty feet in, but its shape was haphazard, and in places the half-orc could not see the ceiling, for it reached in shafts beyond even his darkvision.   Creeping forward he chose a passage to the right, after hearing the lapping of water coming from a passage in front and to the left.  The passage he chose climbed upward, and the hulking ranger struggled to keep his grip and he pulled his muscled bulk up from stone to stone.  He crawled on his belly through pounds of bat guano.It was a long dangerous climb, and he rested on every large ledge he could find, to catch his breath and continued.  He thanked Nephthys for his magical boots, because even through their protective enchantment the cold of the slick stones nearly numbed his thick calloused fingers.   More than 80 feet above where he had come in, a slanted shaft made by three cracked slabs gave way to the open air.  He pulled himself up onto a narrow ledge, that had a drop far beyond his vision on the other side of it.  The black and gray stones of the broken land went off as far as he could see, and he blinked his eyes to keep the cold rain out.  Suddenly, there was flash to his left, someone hastily put out a fire beyond his vision, for a sending in the dying members he though he saw a hunched form climb down.  There was no way to reach that plateau from where he was, and the water here came down like a river over stone.  Climbing further would be hard for him and impossible for most others, except perhaps Jeremy.  He climbed back down to find another way.The floor of the more central path gave way to jagged stairs that tumbled down to an even damper darkness.  Beneath his feet Ratchis felt gravel and sand give way, and then his boots squished in mud, all the while going further and further down.  He held his hammer in one hand and put a hand to the wall of the narrow passage to lend balance.  Eventually it opened into an even bigger and flooded cavern. There was a small beach-like outcropping, but the water smelled of death and minerals.  Ratchis touched a drop to his tongue and spit it out.  It was foul.He noted tracks of sandaled feet on the beach and the tell-tale sign of a small boat that been dragged up on the beach several time and then pushed off with an oar.  He could not see the other side, but hopping it was shallow enough and knowing his boots protected him from the cold he waded in.  He had barely gone out for our five feet when the bottom gave way plunging him in above his waist.  He paused and considered going back when he felt strong hands grasp both of his legs.  Lurching backward he looked down to see rotting dwarven forms trying to pull him down to a watery doom.  One twisted his leg with such strength, he felt himself getting pulled under as it gave way.  He shuddered in pain.Ratchis leapt back, grabbing his chain of scored links in his left hand and calling to his goddess.  The undead dwarves let go and melted into the darkness of the water.  Ratchis hurried back out to the first chamber, breathing hard.The passage to the left was broader than the first two, and while it started going by winding down further into the earth, after several turns it began climbing by way of oddly angled plateaus that might have been steps for giants even greater than those the Fearless Manticore Killers had faced, but these steps had been made by falling stones, and were jagged and covered in bat guano.  Despite the littered feces, Ratchis could tell the air here was fresher.  He climbed a bit and found the passage way ended a narrow crawlspace, no mare than three feet high.  Not wanting to go beyond it because of how difficult retreat would be he returned to his companions and described what he found.“We face another vast army of undead,” Beorth said, when he heard of the undead.  “With a name like the Pit of Bones, we can hardly expect any less.  Anubis will be done.”They walked down to the first chamber and looked around more.  Kazrack looked up the shaft which Ratchis had first climbed. “When will you learn to fly, Martin?” the dwarf asked the watch-mage.“I don’t know,” Martin replied sounding annoyed.“I don’t mean to sound like Kazrack,” Ratchis asked, but you once made a magical dome we could sleep in, could you make a magical boat?”“I used a scroll for that, and, no,” Martin said. (1) The way to the left seemed the only way to go.Martin sent Thomas to crawl past first and then described what he saw the best he could.  The squirrel described many climbs leading to an open plateau and what he thought might be a way down deeper in the center of the huge slabs of upturned igneous rock.“Ooh, I see someone!” Thomas cried. “Hide!” martin commanded.“Already have,” the squirrel familiar replied.  “I’m coming back.”“He saw someone,” Martin told the others.“Like a monk?” Ratchis asked.“No, he said it was small, like a gnome or a dwarf.”“Or an undead dwarf,” Ratchis said.“Could the monks be commanding these undead?” Kazrack asked.“If they split from Beorth’s order, they should have no power over the undead,” Ratchis speculated.“I do not think Anubis would support this,” Beorth said.“But another god or power might,” Martin said.“If these monks have turned Anubis and now flaunt his edicts so boldly as to command the undead they will die on my sword,” Beorth said, without a trace of emotion.  “But we should try to take them alive to learn the truth of them before we dispense justice.Ratchis nodded.The crawl was not as long as they feared, as they moved beneath the tons of rock on their belies, dragging their packs with ropes behind them.After that was more the ‘giant steps’; some were only a few feet, but were as tall as 18 feet, Jeremy and Ratchis would climb up first and pull up the others with a rope.  Kazrack was hurt leaping across a shallow pit, when he did not quite make it.Jeremy and Derek laughed.Up and up they went, winding in broad arcs ever to their left.  Finally they came upon flat plateau of  black stone, shaped like triangular wedge, divided by a perpendicular wall of cracked stones that seemed forces up through the sheer rock floor.  Coming out of the ascending passageway, a narrow stone outcropping blocked their view on their left, but on the great were great mottled overhangs of stone.  Ratchis could see great pieces of ice on the upper stones, cracking and melting. Coming around the outcropping, Ratchis could see they were above a great opening that broad lip of stone creating by mighty slabs of the stone shoved up out oft earth at sharp angles.  Ratchis came forwardsand saw they were over a hundred feet, perhaps as much as 120’, above the upper portion of the area below, a whole swath to the right was even deeper and shrouded in darkness.  Jagged stones covered everything, giving the place the appearance of thousands of jagged beaks.There was a very steep ramp covered in places by splotches of the black jagged stones that ran parallel to the face of the plateau that hung over the great chasm.  Getting down would be treacherous, Ratchis saw.He looked back and saw that Derek and Jeremy were the first to climb up the last small 'gaint step' and come out on to the plateau and Beorth was close behind them.Suddenly there was a commotion below.  Ratchis looked down to see a small, probably gnomish figure go dashing across the black upper slab.  The sound of his chain shirt jingling echoed in and out if the sound of the water, and it was clear he held some weapon in his hand. Less than a moment later another figure appeared below them (both were running in the way the party faced so their backs were to them).  It was a tall lanky human man with a shock of silver hair.  He wore armor as well, but had a hand and a half sword held over his head as he poured on speed to cut down the more diminutive figure.End of Session #52 ---------------------------------------------------------------Notes:(1) This was back in the Honeycombe.  See Session #24</blockquote>

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